DaveWave94

I have to ask out of curiosity: is the metallic background in your photos an operating table or a sheet of metal?

I guess/hope it's easier to follow along than my memories of the Discord server. A smaller group could serve chill conversations better. Walden fulfills the admin role exceptionally well, he's got quite a talent for community management 👍🏻

Agreed, especially when it's always 4 days of work and then a single day off 😩

Since today was my only day off and I had to spend it with cleaning, grocery shopping and getting a gas/fuel refill at the gas station in freezing temperatures, I am kinda in the mood to spread at least a little bit of positivity: one of my recent discoveries on YT is a channel that emulates typical late 70's documentaries called British Cryptids. If they didn't use AI-generated parts in some earlier videos, I might've totally believed that it was some kind of Lost Media that's recently been found in an archive. Thankfully, they listened to community feedback and don't use any AI generated interview segments anymore, as those felt kinda misplaced and jarring for the time vibe they were going for. Here's a nice video from this channel: The Woodwose of Cannock Chase - on a related note, "Woodwose" was a word that I was completely unfamiliar with as a non-native english speaker, but I find it rolls off the tongue nicely. At least better than "Sasquatch".

I also realised it's now a week since I promised to join the Zulip server. Long story short, early shifts suck badly and the fatigue fries my already short memory even more. I'll get around to it eventually though.

Shave-tures of the Night - 21. November 2025

• Prep: Urtekram Face Wash
• Brush: Omega Roma Colosseo 31 mm
• Razor: RazoRock Hawk V2 w/ Superknurl handle
• Blade: Kai Captain Protouch MG
• Lather: HAGS - Creatures of the Night (Mutton Tallow Base)
• Post Shave: OAM - Dolce Vita ASB Gel

1 pass on the head, 2 on the face around a fresh henriquatre beard.

So I have to confess that I abruptly ended my November moustache experiment about a week ago. It was simply looking unkempt to me, no matter what I tried, so I buzzed everything off as I began to dread looking into mirrors. Since then, I grew out my beard until I had enough to go back to a full goatee/doorknocker/henriquatre. I realised that I like to have my facial hair short and uniform, so I am probably stuck in this limbo state of Schrödinger's Facial Hair (having some kind of beard but at the same time kinda not). Currently it's back down to 3 mm and I try not to obsess too much about it.

My head or rather the back of my neck still hasn't healed up 100%, so this was another one pass WTG shave. Still comfortable despite the Hawk not being the best dome razor: it's a bit cumbersome in certain areas.

This mutton base by HAGS doesn't have a fancy name AFAIK, but it's really easy to get very slick even with just a thin layer of soap. I rarely reach for the Hawk and it's probably not only because it's not very nimble for head shaving; it's also rather harsh, but thankfully most irritation on my face where "trimmer bites" from my beard trim earlier today. It does the job, sure; yet I find it even kinda lacking for getting good lines/contours in comparison to my Leaf Thorn or the MMOC.

CotN and Dolce Vita is yet again a very sweet combo, both share a musk note but it's kinda overshadowed by other more prominent scents. In CotN, it's a powdery sweetness reminiscent of american barbershop soaps. In DV, it's caramel. Usually sweet stuff is not my style, but since we had frosty minus degrees lately (Celsius NOT Fahrenheit, in case our american friends where worried) - it fits with a winter vibe. Have a nice weekend, everyone. I'll work.

Apologies, I tend to forget that you're rather limited with commercial products in the US. Even though my original reply came off rather snobbish towards Nivea balms, I want to say that IMHO the Men sensitive ASB is indeed their best product. Since skincare is one of my hyperfixations, I just found the comparison to ZM artisan products a bit weird. But no ill intent on my side, honestly.

I can relate to that though. A lot of artisan balms smell great, but - well - they go bad very fast and that's just not justifying the high price for me personally. I mostly go for alcohol-free toners nowadays, as both lower face and my scalp are very dry skin areas for me and combine them with more commercial/readily available balms. Unfortunately, artisan balms in big 100 ml bottles will go bad for me; case in point, I probably need to pour most of my old artisan balms/lotions down the gutter and that's not really appreciative of the great quality they have.

Zing aftershave serum is great stuff. Maybe even better than Nivea Sensitive Balm!

If the new "aftershave serum" is like the "recovery splash", it should be leagues ahead of Nivea balms. Together with a few other aftershave toners, the Zingari post-shave products are the cream of the crop for skincare after shaving. At least in my experience. I never understood the hype for Nivea, probably just Beiersdorf being good at marketing. Even for german options available in our supermarkets or drugstores, it doesn't hold a candle to Sebamed ASB or Speick products.

Nice goods! The ZM Stargazer set sounds especially interesting and I really like the great label art. Well deserved for keeping our little community here running!

@PorkButtsNTaters666@sub.wetshaving.social , great gesture 👏🏻

I read an interesting blog post after a short research: the Escher stones originally came from the area near Sonneberg, a southern thuringian city famous for developing and manufacturing all kinds of children's toys. The sharpening stones themselves are rather rare and therefore expensive. Something new to me, but nevertheless quite interesting!

18. November 2025

• Brush: Omega Roma Colosseo 31 mm
• Razor: RazoRock Cyber Medium w/ 316L Bamboo handle
• Blade: BIC Chrome Platinum
• Lather: Ariana & Evans - Ouddiction (K2e)
• Post Shave: HAGS - Barberwood (Toner)

Only a single WTG pass head shave after it was finally possible to shave my head again. The cut on the back of my neck has almost healed up and thankfully the Cyber is rather mild to my scalp.

The Ouddiction + Barberwood combo was a really great match, both have rather sweet but masculine cologne scents. Also, whatever is in K2e base makes my skin feel really good. Unusual for an A&E soap, this is almost ZM or WK Levels of comfort!

Small WSDB nitpick: it automatically capitalizes every word I want to enter, even the mm for the brush knot diameter. But still: it's a very useful tool and definitely beats always copying my template from my notes app! Speaking of brushes, only today did I realise that I misspelled the brush name in my previous posts. It's Colosseo, not Colossea... Well, aside from medical terms, my latin sucks.

Thanks for the help and infos! I'll surely check out the Zulip server soon anyway 👍🏻

Yep, it definitely is the right time for it 👍🏻

The box is what interests me the most. Currently I have an Xbox Series X that I got while they were on discount - unfortunately that's connected to Microsoft and their shady practices. Unfortunately I don't have the funds nor the time to go deeply into PC gaming, so it'd be the perfect device for me. The only downside is no physical media whatsoever, but I fear that's dead in gaming anyways. If I buy a disc nowadays, I have only a few hundred MBs on it and then the whole rest is downloaded from the XB Store. I'd need a new Blu-ray/DVD-Player for my growing movie collection, but that's a sacrifice I'm willing to make. The Steam Deck reminds me of the Sony PSP I used to have, handheld gaming certainly would be a welcome thing in my single household again. How do you like your Deck so far?

+1 on the Linux front. IMHO, SteamOS together with distros like Bazzite, CachyOS and Pop!OS that are already very welcoming to gaming needs will probably help to firmly establish the Linux platform in gaming. I still plan to change my OS on my laptop to a Linux distro soon, even though there will be a a steep learning curve...